


Surprise

by ThatMasterOnline



Category: Far Cry 4
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-28
Updated: 2018-07-28
Packaged: 2019-06-17 17:16:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15466227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatMasterOnline/pseuds/ThatMasterOnline
Summary: Sabal has a surprise for Ajay he's sure he'll like.





	1. Surprise

**Author's Note:**

> So chapter one is the "good ending" and chapter two is the "bad ending". Choose whichever one suits your fancy ^^

“Ajay, come with me.”

“What? Why?”

“Don’t ask, just come. I have a surprise for you.” Sabal took him by the hand, leading him towards the centre of Banapur village.

“Sabal, what is it?”

“You’ll see.”

“...Sabal, seriously, what is it? Are you going to take me to a safehouse and suck me off, what?” Sabal burst out laughing.

“No!” He said between chortles, “...Unless you want me to.” With his words suddenly thrown back at him, Ajay flushed, averting his eyes.

“I...wouldn’t be entirely opposed to that…” Sabal smiled, and gave him this look, and his breath caught in his throat.

“Then I’ll see what I can do about later, alright? But first, your surprise. Do you hear it?” Ajay frowned, trying to listen. The typical noise and bustle of Banapur was gone, replaced by a man, speaking.

“Looking around at Kyrat now, I can say with confidence that I couldn’t be more proud.” The crowd erupted into cheers, and as soon as they rounded the corner, Ajay’s heart stopped.

His...father. His father was on a makeshift podium...giving a speech...to Banapur.

And then they locked eyes, and Mohan SMILED at him, a smile that said Mohan RECOGNIZED HIM, and Ajay thought for sure he was going to pass out. 

...Apparently Sabal thought the same thing, because his arm wrapped firmly around his waist, and he found himself needing the support to stay standing.

“Ajay? Stay with me, Ajay.” Sabal’s voice sounded distant. Was he talking to him? ...Did it matter?

Mohan stepped down from the podium and was swarmed by people immediately, congratulating him, thanking him, and generally just wanting to meet him. Mohan took the attention with good grace for about five seconds before he murmured something into the nearest person’s ear, and that person began pushing people away.

“Give him space, people, he’s going to see HIS SON…!”

Before Ajay knew it that smile that made him sway on his feet was right in front of him, and the hands that went to his arms to support him only served to make him feel more weak.

“This is him. My little Ajay.” His eyes stung, and Mohan moved to wrap an arm around Ajay’s shoulders, gently pushing him towards a nearby building.

“Let’s take this somewhere more private. This is our moment, Ajay, and I won’t have anyone else seeing it. Sabal, as much as I appreciate this, that includes you.”

“If I thought Ajay wouldn’t collapse the moment I let him go I’d be gone already. Let’s get him into a chair first.”

“I did say it would be too much of a shock for you to spring this on him like this…”

“For all the times Ajay said he never knew or cared about his father, I assumed this would be a lukewarm reunion at best!” Ajay was barely listening, too acutely aware of the arm around his shoulders. His father’s arm.

“Saying ‘I don’t care’ is very often what young children tell themselves to try to force down the pain of loss...isn’t that right, Sabal?” The door to the safehouse swung open and Ajay was carefully set down on the bed. He didn’t realize he had fallen backward until a pair of hands - his father’s, HIS FATHER’S - gently swung his legs up onto the bed.

“Ajay? Can you hear me?” Even his father’s voice was sounding hazy and indistinct. He didn’t want to lose a second with his father, but…

“...Ajay?” 

He was gone.

***

Everything was quiet, when he woke. Had he been sleeping? Had he fallen asleep by accident? And then the thought flashed into his mind.

HIS FATHER. 

He jerked awake, sitting up and looking frantically around the room. He was there. HE WAS THERE. Right there, sound asleep in a chair beside his bed like it was the most natural thing in the world. He reached out, afraid to touch but needing to know, and his father was THERE, and he was solid, and Ajay could feel the softness of his skin, the rough denim of his jacket, the material of the shirt underneath, the pins holding back long, messy hair.

“D...dad?” Mohan woke almost immediately, and Ajay’s hand jerked back, afraid he had somehow done something to break the impossible dream he was living. Mohan’s eyes locked on his, and he seemed to understand because he reached out and took Ajay’s hand in his own, pulling it to his chest. And then suddenly his hand wasn’t enough, and he moved to put his head where his hand had been, feeling and hearing the dull beat of his heart.

He closed his eyes against the painful sting, wrapping his arms fully around his father and crushing him in a hug as he started to sob. Ajay only sobbed harder when hands wrapped around his own back in return, stroking him soothingly, and a warm voice sounded in his ear.

“Shh...I’m here, Ajay, I’m here. I’m here now, and I won’t ever leave you again. Shh, let it out…” He cried like a child, holding his father like he was afraid he would disappear at any moment, and there were so many emotions swirling around in his head that he simply couldn't function. He had so many things he wanted to say, to ask, but none of that was happening anytime soon because first he needed to CRY.

“Shh...Main yahaan hoon, Ajay, main abhee yahaan hoon.” He didn’t understand, but it didn’t matter because he was crying too much to respond anyways.

After what felt like hours, the tears had dried and been replaced by nausea and an awful headache, and Mohan held him through that, too, giving him room to breathe. He tapped Ajay gently with something cold, and Ajay drank the offered water gratefully. When he had finally returned to some semblance of a normal state, he pulled back, but Mohan kept his hands held tight.

“Aapake paas bahut saare prashn hona chaahie.” Ajay stared at him. Seconds passed in painful silence, and the moment Mohan’s brows furrowed in hurt confusion Ajay felt the tears coming back. 

“Ajay…” Mohan’s voice was a soft whisper, and the shame flooding his body in that moment was downright agonizing. He’d barely been with his father for five seconds, and already he was disappointing him. 

Just like he disappointed his mother. That was him. Ajay Ghale, the family fuckup.

“...You don’t...You don’t understand your own language?” It had never been a problem until now, but now Ajay wanted to die, he wanted to curl up in a corner and never have to see anybody ever again, because at least then he couldn’t disappoint anybody, because that was ALL HE EVER DID…!

“I’m sorry…I’m sorry, dad, I’m sorry…” And there was that silence, that silence he knew so well, that silence he’d heard so many times from his mother, and Ajay realized it was because he didn’t even sound like a Kyrati. It was all true, wasn’t it? All those awful things the kids said in school? Half-breed, the not-american who couldn’t even go back where he came from because he couldn’t speak the language…

“Ishwari never taught you? Ishwari never spoke your language to you, even in America? She...I...Things went sour between us, and I understand why she fled Kyrat, but...for her to...to...to separate you from...from your language, your HERITAGE…! ...Nothing? She truly taught you...nothing?” Ajay shook his head, and Mohan wrapped his arms around him.

“For all of Ishwari’s sins...I never hated her more than I do in this moment. For all the times she screamed that the sins of the parents should never be taken out on the children...That’s exactly what she did. She may not have killed you like I killed Lakshmana, but she killed your sense of belonging...and that is a fate worse than death, isn’t it, Ajay?” Ajay didn’t dare speak. He didn’t want to shame his father with his foreignness. His father could sense that too, dammit, could probably smell the shame radiating off of him, and he started saying everything Ajay needed to hear, everything Ajay had needed to hear since he was six years old, since the first time he realized he didn’t belong in his own home.

“Ajay, look at me. Ajay, none of this matters, I love you no matter what language you speak, or what your voice sounds like. You...Ishwari has raised you to be a man I can be proud of. Everyone here speaks so highly of you, the man who is kind-hearted, and strong-willed, and soft-spoken...I love you, Ajay. I love you because of who you are and how you were raised, not in spite of it, and I vow, here and now, to spend the rest of my life proving that to you...And to spend the rest of my life trying to help you find your sense of belonging. You live in Kyrat now,  
for better or for worse, and I will not rest until the little house on the hill becomes your home.” Ajay’s eyes stung again, and he forced back the tears only because the last thing he needed was to get sick. 

“Dad, I…” He faltered, and Mohan pulled him close, sighing.

“I know.”

“I...You...She was a baby…” 

“And I have had to live with my sins every day. I give you my word, Ajay, I was prepared to die that night. When Ishwari showed up at our home, with a gun in her hand, I knew, and I accepted my death. We can both agree I deserved it. When Kyra saw fit to keep me alive...I knew it meant that I could no longer be the leader the Golden Path needed. Even twelve year-old Sabal would be a better leader than I. That was a difficult lesson to learn, and for many months I cursed the life I had been given, but...well, all wounds heal eventually, and the blow to my pride did as well. I fled the country in secret, with Darpan’s help. I told him to take the secret of my continued existence to his grave, and I am glad to see that he did...though I am sorry he came to his grave so early. We had operatives making smuggling runs to Patna, where I lived, and when I heard them talking about Pagan Min’s demise...I felt I could return. Now that the Golden Path no longer needed a leader, I could return home. Besides, Sabal has been an incredible leader, and the people are happy under his leadership...Though I hear you had a hand with that. Needed to smack some sense into Sabal at the end too, did you?” Ajay looked away, the joke doing nothing to lighten Ajay’s mood.

“Mom said...Kyrat was always going to change me…”

“She needn’t have worried. It changed me, and it changed Sabal, but you continue to be the moral compass this country needs. Ajay...I haven't said this directly yet, but it needs to be said. I am sorry. I am...beyond sorry. I am so sorry that I killed Lakshmana. I don’t know who that man was, but I...I assure you it wasn’t me. I look back on what I did now, and...I don’t know how I ever thought those actions were justified. I don’t know how I took my anger at Ishwari out on a child. My anger at her is still there, I don’t think I could ever forgive her for what she did, but I had no right to lay a hand on her child.”

“...She fell in love with Pagan, that’s what she did.”

“...Who told you that?”

“Pagan did. He had no reason to lie to me, I was holding a gun to his head.”

“I believe you, Ajay. I believe that Pagan truly thought she loved him. Perhaps she did. That does not change the fact that her journals recount many nightly trysts, and she does not mention the same man twice.”

“Bullshit.”

“...I have kept the evidence. It's right here, Ajay. This, too, will be a painful lesson, but you must know the truth.”

“Bullshit,” Ajay snapped, but he took the papers anyways, and he only got as far as a few pages before he threw them away and started pacing.

“Breathe, Ajay.” Ajay ignored him, and after a few moments of agitated pacing he sank to the ground.

“I...It’s not...my mother was not…”

“She changed herself after that night. We both did. The mother you knew was not a whore, Ajay. Believe that. These things are all in the past. We must know the truth of what happened in the past, but then we must allow it to be in the past, and focus on the present. The present, Ajay, is us. I am here. Surely you have wondered…?”

“...All the other kids in school...drew mommies and daddies in the family pictures...and I never had a daddy to draw, and the kids laughed at me, and the teachers sometimes gave me bad marks because they thought my work wasn’t done...Sometimes I drew a daddy in my pictures just so I could be like the other kids…” Mohan sighed.

“It’s the little things that hurt us the most, isn’t it, Ajay?” Ajay nodded, and Mohan pulled him close.

“I’ll never leave you again, my son. I will stay with you, forever.”

“How...how did you survive? That night…”

“By Kyra’s grace alone. I awoke in a pool of my own blood, and nursed my wounds. Darpan found me, and I ordered him to speak nothing of my survival. I would not tell him who had attacked me, to save Ishwari’s good name. He helped me flee the country, told the people of my murder, and then life carried on. Now, enough talk of the past. I...I know I have so much more to explain, but...I just want to hold you right now. Please allow me that simple pleasure, Ajay.” Ajay nodded, and he relaxed in his father’s arms. No more upsetting talks about the past or what happened, just him, and his father, and the joy that buzzed through his body at the feel of a fatherly embrace. His father tucked him into bed, but Ajay refused to let him leave, and so he curled up in bed with Ajay and continued to hold him tight. When his father’s breathing grew deep and even, Ajay followed suit, finally at peace.


	2. Waking Up

“Ajay?” Ajay jerked awake, looking around the room frantically. The chair was back in its usual spot, and his father was nowhere to be found. Sabal was frowning at him.

“I’m sorry to disturb you, brother. Were you having a nightmare?" Was...Had it all...No, no no no no no…

“Sabal, wh...where is he?” When Sabal frowned in confusion, he started shaking.

“Where is who, brother?” Sabal would know. If...if it had been real...Sabal would know. The day after reuniting with his father, Sabal would know that he was looking for his father, wanting to make sure it wasn’t the best possible dream that became a nightmare only because he woke to find his father was still dead…

“Ajay? Ajay, you’re...you’re crying…” Ajay didn’t respond. He couldn’t. He needed his father, needed to feel the warmth of his skin and hear his voice telling him that everything was alright...But he couldn’t. Because it had all been fake. His breathing grew more frantic, but he didn’t realize he had started to sob outright until Sabal hesitantly wrapped him in a hug and started to soothe him. 

“Ajay, I...It’s alright, Ajay, shh…” He felt Sabal making soothing motions on his back, but all he could think about was the fact that those hands weren’t his father’s, and he sobbed all the harder for it. 

“Shh...it was just a dream, Ajay, it can’t hurt you…” His mother used to say that to him all the time, that dreams couldn't hurt you because they weren’t real, but it was a lie. Dreams could hurt you, because they weren’t real.


End file.
